


frost is but slender weeks away

by adamantiums



Category: Archive 81 (Podcast)
Genre: First Kiss, Kinda?, M/M, No Plot, Not really sure how to tag this..., Out of Character, Potentially OOC, heart to heart, literally no one on earth thinks this is a cool ship except me... it's ok i get it, some vaguely depressed rambling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:47:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24624199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adamantiums/pseuds/adamantiums
Summary: That cramped, trapped feeling never left him, and sometimes Dan felt closer to a rat in a maze than a person trying to save the world. He chuckled at the thought. Rats just couldn’t seem to leave him alone, huh?Rat. Dan tried not to ponder on Rat’s existence too much. Tried his best to overlook the monster side of him and focus on the more human parts. The parts that wanted a nickname, that called Dan his friend, that liked to watch wisps because he thought they were pretty. Those human parts.or: dan powell deals with his emotions in a way he would deem poor in the morning
Relationships: Dan Powell/Rat
Comments: 14
Kudos: 65





	frost is but slender weeks away

**Author's Note:**

> not to be pretentious but the title is from this robert p.t. coffin poem (that i didn't know existed until i started googling around for title ideas about the northern lights):
> 
> Frost is but slender weeks away,  
> Tonight the sunset glow will stay,  
> Swing to the north and burn up higher  
> And Northern Lights wall earth with fire.  
> Nothing is lost yet, nothing broken,  
> And yet the cold blue word is spoken:  
> Say goodbye to the sun.  
> The days of love and leaves are done.
> 
> wrote this little piece over a series of late ass nights so cut it some slack and please forgive my rusty dialogue skills

Dan was tired. He wasn’t really supposed to get tired, not anymore, not with this thing inside him, but he was. He was deeply, achingly tired in a way he didn’t know how to cure, a way that he could not escape. But despite it, he still was unable to sleep. So, as a cheap attempt to cure this dreaded insomnia, Dan took to wandering the outpost at night. Not exploring, not really -- he didn’t so much care for what was behind all those doors -- but the restless boredom tore at him and he desperately needed to be out of that cramped radio room.

So Dan wandered, and it eased his restless body, but it did nothing to soothe his thoughts. He was stuck, without any way to immediately help himself or his friends (friends? Is that what they all were?). There was no hope for instant relief, only tedious, exhausting work with all those goddamn tapes. That cramped, trapped feeling never left him, and sometimes Dan felt closer to a rat in a maze than a person trying to save the world. He chuckled at the thought. Rats just couldn’t seem to leave him alone, huh?

Rat. Dan tried not to ponder on Rat’s existence too much. Tried his best to overlook the monster side of him and focus on the more human parts. The parts that wanted a nickname, that called Dan his friend, that liked to watch wisps because he thought they were pretty. Those human parts.

Thinking about Rat led Dan’s mind to the only room he had been in outside the outpost’s central wing. That room with the lights -- the wisps, Rat had called them. Dan smiled to himself in the dark; they really were beautiful. Relaxing. A good distraction.

And so, an hour later, Dan was lying on the floor and staring up at a room full of beautiful, dancing lights, listening to their theremin-like songs. Trying his absolute hardest to think of nothing but the scene before him. Failing. He felt his eyes start to well up with tears, unable to quell that feeling of hopelessness he had grown so used to.

“Daniel Powell?”

Dan jumped. He wiped his eyes hurriedly and propped himself up on his elbows just enough to see a silhouette in the doorway -- one that he recognized immediately (as if the voice wasn’t enough).

“Rat, hey.”

“What are you doing, Dan?”

“Just,” Dan stumbled for an answer, realizing mid sentence that he didn’t really know. “Just resting, I guess.”

“You know your new body doesn’t need to-”

“Yes, I know, but I’m just… tired. Exhausted.” Everything Rat said sounded so enthusiastic, so genuinely full of wonder and childlike cheer. Dan almost envied him, but not quite. His humanity was worth more to him than Rat’s was, and it wasn’t something he would have given up willingly. He felt the tears threatening again. 

“What are you doing here? It’s very late.” Dan gazed up at Rat as he started into the room, tried to focus on the soft echo his footsteps caused, composed himself slightly. He considered the question, thought for a moment that he might not know the answer to this one either. He answered truthfully.

“I don’t know. I guess it’s just relaxing.” Rat smiled. Dan couldn’t see it, not really, but he could hear it in his voice when he replied.

“It is, isn’t it.” Rat was standing next to Dan now, gazing wistfully up at the lights. He seemed almost hypnotized by them. Dan lowered himself back down onto the floor, one hand underneath his head and one laid across his chest. Without meaning to, he sighed, and the tears in his eyes started to fall silently.

“Dan, are you-” Rat started. He cut himself off when he realized Dan was crying. “Why are you crying?” Rat sounded shocked, maybe as close to worry as Dan had ever heard him. He knelt down.

Before Dan could react, Rat’s hand was on his face. His thumb wiped Dan’s tears from one eye, then moved to the other. It was gentle, but there was no tenderness in the touch, nothing to suggest that Rat was doing this for any other reason than logical sense. Dan knew this. Rat thought in black and white, and was not in the habit of connecting with people. But as he drew his hand away Dan found himself longing for the touch to go on longer. He leaned toward Rat’s hand as it went, then decided he had nothing to lose and reached out and grabbed Rat’s wrist, guided his hand back to his cheek. Dan still didn’t move. He avoided looking at Rat; instead he closed his eyes and leaned into the touch, tried to pretend he was somewhere else. But Rat was talkative.

“Dan? What are you doing?”

“It’s just- it’s been so-” Dan opened his eyes and finally turned his head to look at Rat, now crouched over him, a strange look on his face. In reality, Rat’s expression was close to how it usually was, but there was a hint of worry that Dan might not have noticed when they first met. He could see it in the corners of Rat’s mouth, in the little lines that had appeared there, and there was a new intensity in his eyes that wasn’t there before. Dan let go of Rat’s wrist and patted the floor next to him. He didn’t answer Rat’s question.

“Come on, lay down. Look at the wisps.” All traces of worry left Rat’s face at once, and he seemed to forget all about what had just happened. He became excited as he laid down next to Dan.

“Oh, you like them too? I think they are beautiful, to look at and to listen to, of course, and they are unlike anything I have ever seen, unlike anyone has ever seen! They are an entirely new human experience, and I find them fascinating.”

“Yeah, they’re pretty great. Relaxing.”

“That is what you said before. Relaxing.” Rat was staring up at the wisps, a look of bewilderment on his face like it was his very first time seeing them. It wasn’t, of course, and yet he found such amusement in them. Again Dan found himself almost envying Rat. How was he able to so easily find contentment? How was he so enthralled with something he had seen dozens of times before? Rat was staring up at the wisps, and Dan was-- well, Dan was staring at Rat. He hadn’t even realized before Rat turned his head away from the ceiling and met Dan’s eyes, and said, “You are beautiful, Daniel Powell.” Dan scoffed.

“Oh yeah?”

“Of course, and I am not only talking about your new body, although it is certainly beautiful, and miraculous, and I am very interested in watching you discover it’s capabilities, but that is not all that I meant. You, Daniel, are beautiful.” Dan’s breath caught in his throat. He laughed again, more genuine this time (but partly out of shock; Dan felt his cheeks start to heat up and thanked God that it was too dark for Rat to tell).

“Well, you’re not too bad yourself, Rat.” Now Rat laughed (a rare sound; Dan forced down a smile), and rolled onto his side to face Dan.

“Now, you do not have to return the compliment! Of course, mirrors are forbidden here, and I have not seen my reflection in a long while, so I am not sure of how I currently look, but it certainly cannot- cannot be…”

Dan acted without thinking. He slung his arm around Rat’s side as he was talking, and Rat trailed off. To Dan’s utter surprise, Rat was completely distracted mid-sentence.

They just looked at each other, then. In the back of Dan’s mind he knew it was strange. Rat was not just a person. Rat was a monster, and one who had turned Dan into exactly the same thing (and Dan hadn’t quite forgiven him for that one yet). He knew that in the daytime he wouldn’t be acting like this, like some lovesick schoolboy, all heart eyes and offhand compliments. But now, in the dead of night and in the midst of this strange exhaustion fueled breakdown, he couldn’t bring himself to care.

So, while he was in the business of not caring, Dan let his eyes wander Rat’s face. He traced his cheekbones, the bridge of his nose, the dip of his upper lip. What’s stopping me now? he thought, and slid his hand down from the small of Rat’s back and let it rest in the curve of his waist, and Rat shifted closer. For the hundredth time that night, Dan was surprised at Rat’s reaction. Never would he have expected Rat to want to be close to him. Not for any personal hindrance, but simply because he was Rat, and Rat did not think in terms of romance. He did not consider people as colleagues, friends, potential partners, but rather as assets or as enemies. It seemed to Dan that Rat perceived the world in the simplest way possible, but now, with Rat pressing closer to him and catching his eyes with something that Dan would have pinned at shyness in any other person, Dan was forced to reconsider. Dan wasn’t in Rat’s head; maybe it was more complicated than he had thought.

Those worry lines had reappeared at the corners of Rat’s mouth.

“Do you want to kiss me, Daniel Powell?” For the first time since Dan had met him, Rat sounded hesitant. Keeping with the night’s growing trend, Dan didn’t let himself think too much on it.

“I think I do, yeah.” And Dan surprised himself by being the first to lean in.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! i may or may not update this with an aftermath, depends on if i'm still bored with this in a couple days. rn i'm content with it as is, but we'll see


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